Tag: frailty

Categories : Ageing HospitalsTags :

Opinion Piece: The Strategic Importance of Caregiving Agency Partnerships for Frail Care Facilities

On By ModernMedia
Photo by Kampus Production

By Dianne Boyd, Branch Manager at Allmed Healthcare Professionals

The demands placed on South African frail care and retirement villages are tougher than ever. These establishments must consistently provide high-quality care, while addressing persistent staffing issues and adapting to an increasingly complex regulatory environment.

The limitations of traditional care models heavily reliant on individually employed caregivers can no longer be ignored. In response, a strategic shift towards collaborating with experienced healthcare professional service agencies is gaining momentum, providing a welcome pathway for facilities to greatly enhance care provision, optimise operational workflows, and mitigate potential liabilities.

Addressing the shortcomings of traditional models

Modern senior care facilities face growing challenges that necessitate efficient resource management. Rising operating costs, stricter regulatory demands, and persistent staffing shortages (particularly for specialised roles) create significant operational burdens. To maintain high standards of care and ensure resident well-being, facilities must adopt innovative solutions that address both operational and care-related needs.

Exceptional care can only be built on in personalised attention, and outsourcing allows facilities to raise their care standards by accessing a pool of highly trained and compliant caregivers in collaboration with a reputable healthcare professional staffing services provider. The right agency partner makes it possible for facilities to prioritise personalised care, ensuring each resident receives the attention required for the best outcomes.

Putting personalised care at the top of the quality scale

Caregiving agencies have an important role to play in implementing robust care plans in collaboration with doctors. By placing caregivers that work under the instructions of the facility’s matron or registered nurse, agencies assume responsibility for ensuring care plans are followed diligently, while clinical facilitators provide continuous training that ensures caregivers are competent and confident in their roles. Such a collaborative approach greatly enhances resident wellbeing and safety. With the expertise of such specialist agencies, retirement villages and frail care facilities can be assured that consistent, high-quality care will be delivered, a critical factor in building trust with residents and their families.

Ensuring competency, continuity of care and flexibility

Traditional work models, where facilities directly recruit and employ caregivers, often struggle with operational logistics in continuity of care and training. Here, staffing shortages due to unforeseen absences can greatly disrupt daily routines. In contrast, partnering with a staffing solutions organisation provides access to a reliable pool of caregivers on-demand.

A professional agency partner handles all scheduling requirements, while ensuring extra caregivers are oriented to the facility. This enables quick replacements (often within two hours) to minimise disruptions and maintain consistent care, while such flexibility also gives the facility the room to scale up or down on caregiving resources in direct response to the changing needs of residents without significant cost.

Critically, a key benefit of partnering with a staffing provider is the comprehensive administrative relief they offer. Agencies manage the entire recruitment process, onboarding, payroll, and continuous training, freeing facilities from these burdens. Here, the agency steps in to simplify processes and mitigate risk by handling everything from start to finish, with thorough criminal and reference checks to minimise security risks and comprehensive recruitment processes that ensure caregivers are proficient in English and possess the necessary skills and attributes for the job.

Outsourcing to continually enhance personalised care standards

One of the most compelling advantages to partnering with a staffing services agency is the fact that the facility has guaranteed access to pre-screened, trained, and compliant caregivers who have been through a rigorous upskilling course to ensure they are well-prepared for the frail care environment. The right staffing partner takes time to understand each facility’s unique needs and matches caregivers accordingly, with business unit managers actively participating in the selection process to ensure the perfect fit.

Equipped with comprehensive training on essential skills, including dementia care, palliative care and rehabilitation, these caregivers can address the specific needs of residents with confidence and compassion. Their specialised training relieves pressure on facilities and ensures residents receive appropriate care, which enhances family satisfaction.

The right partner also employs clinical facilitators designated to provide on-site training and support, so that the facility is assured caregivers are up to date with the latest care practices and technologies to continuously enhance the overall quality of care. Facilities benefit from collaborative training opportunities, further upskilling their own staff at no additional cost. Significantly, these specialised care services can supplement the core offerings of the facility to better meet the diverse needs of residents, attract a broader clientele and strengthen their market position.

An essential shift toward high-quality care

For the future of senior care, strategic partnerships with healthcare staffing providers are no longer optional, but essential. These collaborations ensure the long-term success of retirement villages and frail care facilities by optimising staffing, enhancing care, and mitigating risks. They are the foundation for delivering exceptional resident experiences and building a culture of safety and trust. These partnerships will allow facilities to meet the demands of today, while building a forward-thinking model for the dignified and compassionate senior care of tomorrow.

Categories : AgeingTags :

Real-time Data Helps Research on when Older People Fall

On By ModernMedia
Photo by Kampus Production on Pexels

When older people lose their balance, they often struggle to recall the circumstances, making studying this phenomenon challenging. Now, a Virginia Tech study using wrist-worn voice recorders concludes that voice recorders are effective at capturing the circumstances and context in which they lost their balance and potentially fell, without relying on recall later. The findings were recently published in the Journal of American Geriatrics Society.

The study, led by Michael Madigan in the College of Engineering, builds on years of his own foundational work and prior research conducted by the University of Michigan Medical School.  “In the past, researchers would ask participants to recall what they were doing when they lost their balance, but memory can be unreliable,” said Madigan. “With this new method, participants record their experiences immediately after an incident, providing much more accurate and detailed information.” 

Real-world insight

In this study, 30 participants, who averaged around 72 years of age, wore voice recorders on their wrists over the course of three weeks, and in the event of balance loss, turned them on to record answers to these key questions: 

  • When and where did the balance loss occur? 
  • What were they doing at the time? 
  • How did they attempt to regain their balance – did they grab a railing, take steps, or sit down? 
  • Why do they think they lost their balance? 
  • Did they fall? 

This immediate, self-reported data was analysed by Madigan and his team. Instead of waiting to meet with researchers after losing their balance, participants could reflect on what happened in the moment. 

“We’re trying to better understand the circumstances in which people lose their balance,” Madigan said. “This process doesn’t require people to think back weeks or months to an incident, especially when memory can be unreliable.” 

Participant experience

Maria Moll, a retired epidemiologist and study participant, found the research particularly meaningful, especially as someone in her 70s who remains physically active. After a friend experienced a fall, Moll became more interested in contributing to balance-loss prevention research. 

“I’ve always been interested in physical fitness and balance, especially as I age,” said Moll. “This study made me more mindful of my movements, particularly during more challenging activities like hiking.” 

The future of real-world data collection

Looking ahead, the team plans to expand the study to larger groups and combine the data with other lab-based measurements. By doing so, they hope to identify individuals who are most at risk of balance loss and develop strategies to proactively address those risks. 

“We want to give clinicians the tools to intervene before a fall occurs,” said Madigan. “This method can provide more reliable, detailed information that helps us understand not just how people lose their balance, but why.” 

Source: Virginia Tech

Categories : AgeingTags :

Cat-borne Toxoplasma Gondii Linked to Frailty in the Elderly

On By ModernMedia
Photo by FOX: https://www.pexels.com/photo/brown-tabby-cat-scratching-head-1265613/

Toxoplasma gondii, a common, cat-borne parasite already associated with risk-taking behaviour and mental illness in humans may also contribute to exhaustion, loss of muscle mass, and other signs of frailty in older adults, suggests a study published in the Journal of Gerontology: Medical Science.

The research, by an international team of scientists including University of Colorado Boulder, University of Maryland School of Medicine and the University of A Coruña in Spain, is the latest to explore how the tiny, single-celled organism T. gondii could have big impacts on human health.

“We often think of T. gondii infection as relatively asymptomatic, but this study highlights that for some people it may have significant health consequences later on,” said co-author Christopher Lowry, a professor at CU Boulder.

Some 11%–15% of people in the US have been infected with T. gondii at some point and rates tend to be far higher in older individuals. In some countries, more than 65% have been infected. Once infected, people can unknowingly harbour the parasite for life.

For the study, the team examined the blood of 601 Spanish and Portuguese adults over 65, along with measures of a common geriatric syndrome known as frailty – which includes unintentional weight loss, tiredeness, loss of cognitive sharpness and other indications of declining health.

A whopping 67% of study subjects were “seropositive” showing markers in their blood of a latent infection.

The researchers did not, as they originally hypothesized, find an association between any infection to T. gondii and frailty. But they did find that, among those infected, those with higher “serointensity” or a higher concentration of antibodies to the parasite, were significantly more likely to be frail.

Higher serointensity could reflect a more virulent or widespread infection, multiple infections or recent reactivation of a latent infection, the authors said.

“This paper is important because it provides, for the first time, evidence of the existence of a link between frailty in older adults and intensity of the response to T. gondii infection,” said co-author Blanca Laffon, a professor of psychobiology at the Interdisciplinary Centre of Chemistry and Biology at University of A Coruña.

How cats spread T. gondii

Wild and domestic felines are considered the definitive host of the parasite, while warm-blooded animals like birds and rodents serve as secondary hosts: When cats eat infected animals, T. gondii takes up residence and multiplies in their intestines, shedding eggs in their faeces.

People are typically infected via exposure to those eggs (via litter boxes, contaminated water or dirty vegetables) or by eating undercooked pork, lamb or other meat that’s infested.

Most people never know they’ve been infected, with only about 10% initially having brief flu-like symptoms. But T. gondii tends to linger dormant for decades, cloaked in cysts in muscle and brain tissue (specifically the emotion-processing region known as the amygdala) with some insidious impacts, mounting research suggests.

In a creepy evolutionary trick seemingly designed to benefit the parasite’s favourite host, rodents infected with T. gondii tend to lose their fear of felines, making it easier for cats to catch rats and mice. In the wild, infected chimpanzees have been shown to actually grow attracted to the smell of the urine of their feline predator, the leopard.

People who have been infected also tend to engage in risky behaviour, with research showing they tend to be more impulsive, more entrepreneurial and more likely to get in a car accident. They also have higher rates of schizophrenia, certain mood disorders, cognitive problems and are more likely to attempt suicide, according to research by Lowry and Dr Teodor Postolache, a professor in the Department of Psychiatry at University of Maryland School of Medicine and senior author on the new study.

A declining immune response?

The authors caution that the new study does not prove causation, but suggests the association should be researched.

They found that frail people with high T. gondii seropositivity also had higher levels of certain inflammatory markers, suggesting that infection with the parasite could exacerbate inflammation that already occurs with aging – aka. “inflammaging.”

Because latent T. gondii tends to hide out in muscle tissue, Postolache suspects it could also play a role in hastening sarcopenia.

Lowry’s research focuses on the impact microorganisms have on the immune system and, thus, mental health. He notes that many microbes that humans have evolved with impact health in a positive way – a theory known as the ‘Old Friends’ hypothesis. Even T. gondii may have health benefits we aren’t yet aware of, he said. But in some cases, a switch flips, and friends become enemies.

In the case of T. gondii, certain medications or immune compromising diseases like HIV or cancer can enable a latent infection to escape suppression and reactivate, with adverse effects. Even in people with healthy immune systems, Lowry notes, immune function can decline with age, potentially wakening dormant dormant T. gondii.

The researchers hope their study will inspire more research into the relationship between T. gondii and frailty, and ultimately lead to new ways of keeping the parasite from doing harm.

For now, they encourage people – especially pregnant and immunocompromised people – to take steps to avoid infection.

Tips for preventing infection:

Change litter box daily, and wash hands afterward.

Avoid eating undercooked meat.

Rinse fruits and vegetables.

If pregnant or immunocompromised:

Avoid changing the litter box if possible (T. gondii infection during pregnancy can cause serious problems to a developing foetus).

Keep cats indoors.

Avoid stray cats.

Source: University of Colorado at Boulder